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Tuesday, June 5, 2018

Solving a mystery?

I love to read mysteries. My favorite genre of book. Just did some housekeeping in the book recording area - I use two online databases to keep track of what I've read. I know - only a geek would do that, but when you are reading 68 series and you need to know what to read next - those lists become very important. And since I started tracking what I read (only novels), I've got 460 logged in. A little bit shy of one a week for the last 10 years. I started tracking at the beginning of 2007. Totally crazy. Now I just need to update that series database so that all 68 series are up to date. That shouldn't take that long and then it'll be a snap to glance at the list and pick a new book to read. No danger of getting a book I've already read. In case you're curious, I have a paid subscription to Collectorz for keeping track of the books I've read and Fictfact for keeping track of the series.

I get asked by various people to identify things or they ask for advice or whatever. Last week I posted this picture of a sewing machine accessory foot. I didn't hear back from any of my followers as to what it could be used for so I asked a couple of industry people. Their guesses as to what it's used for are below.

Mystery presser foot

"I have never seen anything like that before but I’d say maybe a seam guide foot or something similar to that idea where you can adjust how wide you want your seam and then the fabric follows along the edge. I’m assuming the front part gets slid into the front of the machine maybe?

Have you tried to see if it has maybe a part number on it and google to see what it could be? Do you know what brand machine it’s for?"

And the second feedback is:

"Well by the plastic, it is generic. Not a machine branded foot.

My guess is seam guide or hem guide for wider hems like curtains."

That's about all I can discover for you - hope that helps.

Then I got asked to help identify this block.

What is the name of this block???

I dug out my Encyclopedia of Pieced Quilt Patterns by Barbara Brackman. At first, the task seemed daunting, but I started at the beginning and carefully looked at all the patterns. EUREKA!!! I found it. About halfway through the book. There's no name to this block but it did reference where she had found the block. Two authors Bishop and Safanda. That was a very interesting task and I'm glad I found it. Actually, I was pretty excited that I found it in the book. Just checked my stash of historical books and I don't have the book by those two authors. DRAT!!! That would have been cool to find the book. OK - so I'm going to ask YOU. Does anyone have this book????

A Gallery of Amish Quilts

If so - can you look and see if you can find a picture of that quilt or that pattern that I've shown above??? And if anyone has these older quilt history books that they no longer want, e-mail me.

Anyone else has a question they know nothing about??? OH - I should mention to the person who asked about the machine foot - is there a name or number on it??? Something further that we can do research on????

I won't be able to vote in the upcoming election this Thursday as I'm out of town. I was going to go to the advance polls but realized yesterday that I missed that opportunity. DRAT!!!! Now I have to go directly to the returning office. It's not as close as the advanced polls, HOWEVER, it's close to the shop where I need to purchase a few new undergarments so I'll kill two birds with one stone. I guess there's a reason why I missed the advanced poll deadline.

Got to madly work on that second pattern today and hopefully get the first draft off by tomorrow. I had planned to get a lot more quilting done this week, but that isn't going to happen as I'll be working on some paperwork stuff that needs to be done this week.

Does this happen at your house???? I've no idea why the kitchen table becomes a dumping ground for everything. And it's 99.9% mine!!!

The dumping ground

Some of the stuff needs to be sent out. Some of it is books to read, some of it is current work and there are TWO bottles of water, a glass of water and my tea press. All mine. Now how does that happen??? I need to get better organized and I NEED to clear a flat surface in the office so that stuff can accumulate here not there. And what happens when I need the table clear, I scoop all that stuff and dump it in the office where it gets forgotten! I've got a long way to go to be better organized. Slowly! I"m way better - those stacks on the kitchen table used to be HUGE.

Here's a wee bit of what's been happening around here. I got that HUGE embroidery block DONE!!!!! It's done! I'm super excited about that. I have to confess that I sat in the gazebo all day Sunday with my page turner audiobook (I guess that sounds kind of silly since I wasn't really turning the pages!). Anyway, I got to a point where I finished embroidering the block but nowhere near done the book. So I popped into the house, traced the remaining FOUR blocks and back out to the gazebo.

Embroidery block - DONE

I almost got half of one of the blocks done before the book was finished. Did I mention that the last four blocks are fairly small compared to this one? A couple of them have complex snowmen on them, but progress is being made. I wonder if I may have to buy another skein or two of embroidery floss. I'm down to two and a half skeins.

I stayed in the gazebo even when it started to rain and then it poured rain and I sat in the gazebo with the girls and we were nice and dry and enjoyed the rain but didn't get wet. Oh - I lied about that. Look at the girls in this picture out in the rain. They were under the trees so not getting super wet. It's hard to take pictures of the rain, but you can see the raindrops dancing in the pond.

The girls enjoying the rain

Then this morning, I had to dig out some fabrics from my scrap boxes. I'm working on this activity book with Ronda. There's a new activity per week. We did start late and there are 52 activities in total. I think we're on the fourth one since it seems to take way more than one week to get some of them done. Not that they are complicated - OH NO - it just takes time to think about it. Here's the activity of this week - pick ten fabrics that you love and ask yourself why you love them? That took a lot of thought process as I LOVE a lot of fabric. Anyway, I decided to take swatches from either a color I loved or a genre. There's a batik, a bicycle, some orange, black and white, Asian fabric, 30's fabric and a nice blender and a piece of Sesquicentennial. All of them have special meaning to me. Now to glue them in and write down why I chose those. I think it'll be fun to go back in a couple of years and read this book and see how my tastes have changed - yet again!!!

Anyway, I was digging out some fabric from the scrap boxes. Oh boy - some of them are getting full and the lids have long since popped off. I put the overflowing orange scrap box on top of the very overflowing brown box and walked back into the studio. Next thing I heard a big crash. Looked in the stash room to find the orange box had fallen off the shelf and was all over the place. OH, CRAP!!!!

I decided it was time to deal with a couple of those boxes as it's more than the brown and the orange that's overflowing. I pulled out the TWO brown scrap boxes and I'm going to start playing with them - EVERYDAY and make something out of the scraps. What will I make??? No idea, but I'm going to play.

Two boxes of brown scraps that need to be dealt with

I guess you'll just have to follow along and see what comes of the scraps.

Here's something interesting to note. Have you ever had an open glass of water in your studio? Just an ordinary glass that you're drinking from?? Have you noticed how much lint collects in that glass in a very short period of time? It's kind of shocking actually. Imagine how much lint and dust we're breathing in?

I also have all my classes from now to the end of this year picked. Now to work out the dates and descriptions. I'll be posting later this month. We also have the patterns for next year's $25 quilt (the ongoing class). I'm super excited about those. I can't wait to get started.

I have pictures to post for Motivational Monday, but I'll leave that for tomorrow. Let's say that my Monday sewing was very productive!!! I'm super excited, to say the least. And yes - I still have a lot of show n tell to post. Too many pictures, not enough time!